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Topic: Morgan's horse (Read 6565 times)

while rereading these books I noticed that Morgan was riding a Barb so I googled it. interesting history. they were bred in North Africa (Barbary coast apparently shares the name derivation) but what was funny was this description in wikipedia:

Due to the amount of cross-breeding, it is difficult to find a purebred Barb today. The Barb generally possesses a fiery temperament and an atypical sport-horse conformation, but nevertheless has had an incredible impact on today's modern breeds.

change a few nouns and its a good description of that half-breed and his impact on the royalty

Three of the horses in my barn are sport-horses, Freisian/ Thoroughbred crosses. They are marvelous heavy horses for riding and for carriage. They are beautiful to watch in motion.

The historical bred of Freisians from the Netherlands were known to be the war horse of the middle ages, able to carry a knight in full armor into battle. They were breed latter to the Spanish Andalusian to make a fine carriage and riding horse. I personally have always considered the breed of R'Kassi to be Freisian/Andalusians. I believe the Arab horse to be too light for the needs of a Knight in chain mail and plate. I see the Torenthi using Arab type horses or Mongolian ponies while riding mostly in scale leather armor.

Now, the story as I have heard it from multiple Freisian breeders (but this is not proven) is that the sire and dam of the stallion named Future owned by Justin Morgan, were a Freisian and a Thoroughbred. My horses have much the same qualities that are attributed to the Morgan Horse, They are lively, energetic, yet easy going and not high strung. Morgan Horses are known to be excellent cavalry mounts. It is easy to see how their temperament and stamina have come from the needs of knights in battle a millennia ago. I have no trouble imagining our Alaric Morgan, or Morgan Haldane for that matter, riding a Morgan Horse.

Freisians are considered a light draft horse or a heavy horse or Warmblood. They were a higher quality war horses than the full draft horses, able to hold the heavy weight of a knight, but faster and trainable for fighting. There are documents of Freisians as war horses from the 12th century. The German horse breeders used the Spanish horses(Andalusians) and breed them to their heavier stocked drafts and developed Warmblood breeds like Hanoverians and Oldenburgs, the Netherlands did the same to develop the Friesian. A cavalry of heavy horse Warmbloods would be daunting to an enemy on slower drafts or lighter mounts such as Arabs and ponies. As gun powered came into warfare, the heavy horses went out of favor, they needed to be faster and lighter, that is why the Morgan horse became so popular in the Civil War.

P.S. I was just reading Wikipedia stating that the Barb was a north African horse that was considered the precursor to the Spanish Jennet. The Spanish Jennet was the foundation horse for the Andalusian.

I am sorry if this is too much horse talk, but doing a little research is always fun.

War horses wouldn't have had to carry quite so much weight in Kelson's day since plate armor wasn't in use yet (at least not to the full body extent that would become standard by the Renaissance period), but even so, maille and metal-backed leather can add a fair bit of weight to a person. I can readily imagine Friesians in the Gwyneddan cavalry. Though I seem to remember KK once saying that she pictured the R'kassi horses as being more like Arabians, but I could be misremembering.